Monday, July 31

“I’m very proud of being half English and I think as time passes my best English qualities are more and more visible,” remarked Moreau. “I’m pleased I can be outrageous as only the English can be.” If being outrageous meant being her own woman, expressing her opinions unreservedly and having a number of well-publicised affairs, then she lived up to the epithet. ...Pure coincidence I’ve just sat through two old favourites, The Train and Monte Walsh.

With a combined age of 1,075 years, the Donnelly family have revealed the secret behind their longevity – porridge oats. “We've always followed Daddy's habit of that nice warm bite before sleep,” said Joe Donnelly, the 72-year-old youngster of the clan. “Porridge at around 10pm, then again for breakfast at 7am. Cooked oats, milk, a spot of apple jam on top.” Of course, tucking into a bowl of porridge twice a day is just part of their wholesome diet, which also sees them enjoy a wealth of fruits, vegetables and meats produced on their 100-acre farm. The clan steer clear of alcohol and experts have questioned whether that has played a role in their incredible longevity. The only exception to this teetotal rule came from their mother who drank an entire bottle of Buckfast after the birth of each of her 16 children “to build her up again.”

England 1 - 0 France. I’m not sure you’d pay good money to watch this sort of thing, but well done the ladies. One in the eye for Macron.

Renowned former BBC presenter Sue MacGregor has said there will never be equal pay for men and women at the broadcaster “until men have babies”. Given Justine Greening’s harebrained scheme for self-select gender assignment this may be sooner than we think.

The Battle of Passchendaele… The memory of my Grandfathers remain with me, as does the significance to both of WWI. Despite the books, the stories and poetry, I have no more sense of the actual reality than I do my Mother’s brothers’ experiences at Dunkirk, Mrs G’s Father’s years as an Allied prisoner of war in Auschwitz, and those that more recently served in Iraq and Afghanistan. Shit job; someone has to do it; glad it wasn’t me.

Sunday, July 30

With these folk gone, next door was tenanted by a mild man, an Army Officer, two girls, a boy, left in his quiet care, his wife, their mother, being some years dead. We shortly found that they were Catholics, the very first I ever came to know. To other friends they might be Teagues or Micks; the lad I quickly found no sort of foe.

Just my own age. His Christian Brothers’ School to me seemed cruel. As an altar boy he served with dread. His magazines were full of faces, places, named, unknown to me. Benburb, Wolfe Tone, Cuchullain, Fontenoy. I still am grateful, Willie Morrissey.

When I was a kid, the lad I played with lived across the road several doors down. His house featured derelict stables out back, a relic from the horse and cart era, and for two little boys something of an adventure playground. He always wore a cap, it never left his head. Because they were a Catholic family I always assumed it was to hide the tiny horns that grew from the top of his forehead. How such notions enter the head of a four-year-old remains a mystery.

Despite their infatuation with the European union and barely disguised campaign to overturn Brexit, British mainstream media remains obsessed with America and the Donald Trump presidency. Given our supposed aversion to chlorinated chicken, newshounds head off across the Atlantic on the slightest of pretexts and consume buckets of the stuff. I suppose for the next couple of weeks we’ll also be treated to blanket coverage of Princess Diana’s demise. Fried chicken and an insatiable need to fetishize death. Geesh! It’s enough to drive you to drink.

Worried I’m going to seed, for the past three weeks I’ve body-swerved the Dog & Duck, paid more attention to my diet and upped the exercise stakes. My sole reward is to have lost one pound in weight. Part of me thinks it ain’t worth the effort, another bit assures me the exercise will benefit my heart. Am also conscious that cycling and gym work did James Hunt little good.

Today’s papers are full of pensions guff, the usual dire warnings of old age penury. When I qualified for my state pension last year I automatically assumed there’d be another twenty years of hijinks to pay for, then goodnight Vienna. To reassure myself I used one of those online longevity calculators which confirmed Gudgeon will expire at 87. I can live with that. Am told current 20-year-olds will probably work until they are 80 and live long enough to receive a birthday card from the monarch. That’s too long. It’s not the longevity per se but the years of ill health in the final stretch, sitting in a care home, dribbling down my bib. Needless to say, I was out on the moor during this morning’s downpour ticking off the miles. If I fail to fulfil expectations it won’t be for the want of trying.

Friday, July 28

I suspect there’s more than enough evidence in the public domain as regards what we should or shouldn’t be doing in moderation, and while decision making will always be trade-off between the competing demands of our physical and mental wellbeing, at the end of the day an individual’s health is his own responsibility. Ergo the new menace, writes Simon Jenkins, is self-diagnosis. Doctors claim that a majority of patients investigate their symptoms online, arriving at the surgery demanding not diagnosis, but prescriptions. Burgeoning health columns in the media have a similar effect. Although this must be frustrating for GPs, it follows the zeitgeist for scepticism of anything passed down from above (although given my limited experience of GPs, healthy scepticism appears a wise approach). The wisest approach, Jenkins believes, remains the old alliance of sceptic and epicurean. What makes you happy cannot be all bad, whatever the nanny state tells you.

Although Jeanette Winterson describes the advance of LGBTQIA rights as progress founded on disgust and pity, she chooses to celebrate how far she’s come. Owen Jones prefers to view all opposition in terms of hatred, and believes society is diseased. There’s a sense of 1930s Berlin in Owen’s spittle-flecked push towards a ‘final triumph’ – anger and searing fury should be the proper response, he says. I wonder which of the two sleeps best at night?

Thursday, July 27

Wednesday, July 26

Ah bless! Vladimir Tretchikoff’s Chinese Girl is no more and Banksy’s Balloon Girl has become the nation’s favourite artwork. There’s nothing I can add to this announcement that would reflect well on me.

Tuesday, July 25

Everyone’s favourite freelance journalist and political activist says booze is a joy – so stop criticising women for drinking. Must admit I have fallen foul of this recently when seated between two women at a dinner party, both strangers to me. For the last umpteen years I’ve been conscious of the opprobrium heaped on men who ply women with booze in order to get their leg over. So much so, and to make sure there’s no misunderstanding, I’ve gotten into the habit of commandeering the bottle as it’s passed around the table and rationing the amount the ladies receive. The two girls went along with this for about ninety minutes before totally losing it and informing me in no uncertain terms what would happen to my nuts if I continued to short-change them. Life’s a minefield these days.

I put it down to reading these action man biographies. Having spent the morning running around town I limped home for an hour or two of log stacking; then feeling the call of the Untersberg, donned my walking boots and set out across the moor. Needless to say I am now cream-crackered. Gudgeon remembers struggling in a cross-country race aged 26 and realising I wasn’t 18 anymore. Forty years on things are not much better. On the plus side: today’s weather is glorious and there was not other soul out there. Just a rather large Chinook.

Monday, July 24

Paying someone else to do the shit jobs – cleaning, cooking, mowing the lawn, household maintenance or even shopping – can buy you happiness, claim researchers. Except if you hail from the Netherlands. Of some 818 Dutch millionaires included in the survey nearly half said they spent no money outsourcing disliked tasks.

Am listening to Eddie Mair on tonight’s PM talking to a show biz commentator about Love Island. He was holding it together so well, all the way from perplexed through to incredulity. Of course in the end Mair cracked and descended into sarcasm. As Tim Stanley says, the programme is smutty class voyeurism of the lowest order. It may be empty, pointless and stupid, but there’s no point getting your knickers in a twist. Two types of people watch this show: the rich laughing at the poor and the poor with terrible sense of aspiration. Why would you watch it? he says. How much of your precious, beautiful life are you wasting? Get off the sofa! Read a book! Find someone to have a relationship with! …I bet Tim’s twitter thingamajig is on overdrive.

It makes a difference when the sun shines. I’m convinced we’d be a different country – a different people, if it deigned to appear more often. Let’s hear it for global warming. I’m struck by how different tea tastes in the open air – reminds me of those Sutton Park summers, the tented tea urns. Our second nest of swallows has fledged, adding to the flight circling above. Masses of butterflies and dragonflies too. And while we’ve seen the best of the fox gloves, purple heather has begun to appear amongst the furze.

In this morning’s Times Matthew Syed ponders the wisdom of old folks. “Chatting to people who have lived long lives is a priceless gift” he says.” It is not just the wisdom they share, but the historical context they so often bring to an understanding of the present.” While most of us appreciate the sentiment I’m not sure it justifies John Humphries’ £650k or is a reason to wheel out Joan Bakewell at the drop of a hat. Truth is that most of us pine for those now long dead so we can ask all those questions we were blind to in our youth.

Sunday, July 23

‘Pinsker’s expertise protected The Beatles’ assets with a range of creative but perfectly legal ideas to keep down their tax bill. But he found he had to warn the boys against profligacy. Early on, the press called them millionaires. Pinsker had to clarify to them that their millions were earnings, not assets, and they needed to set aside a lot of those earnings for tax. They were never happy with that – that’s why George wrote Taxman. They’d been poor boys, who’d worked hard and made money, and now someone was trying to take it away.’

If you drive a car, I'll tax the street, If you try to sit, I'll tax your seat. If you get too cold I'll tax the heat, If you take a walk, I'll tax your feet. Don't ask me what I want it for If you don't want to pay some more 'Cause I'm the taxman, yeah, I'm the taxman Now my advice for those who die Declare the pennies on your eyes 'Cause I'm the taxman, yeah, I'm the taxman And you're working for no one but me.

Saturday, July 22

There are six rams in the far paddock. One is a formidable beast with a head resembling that of a giant pit bull. He looks capable of eating a sheep dog instead of being intimidated by one. Whenever we lock eyes I sense the challenge: ‘Any time, sonny, if you think you’re hard enough.’ Reminds me of Shiner, our late Staffie.

I’ve struggled to generate enthusiasm for Sea Bass. Yesterday’s fish, however, – fresh from Brixham Market – went a long way to correcting my opinion. Although we’re fortunate in the South West with the quality of produce, reading Giles Coren’s restaurant reviews from his recent trip to Bath (today’s Times) merely reinforces Gudgeon’s reluctance to eat out as regularly as was once the custom. As he says, you trek to wherever, eat a bad meal in a bad building surrounded by bad people, and then come home and try to forget about it. Even the good stuff rarely rates higher than 7/10. I’ve tried a couple last month that were 3/10 at best, and neither was staffed by warty Bulgarians.

Jeremy Corbyn... “I’m having some time away then I am campaigning in marginal seats right across the country. I’m looking forward to being in Scotland for the Edinburgh Festival as part of that.” We’ve all pulled this scam: taking a holiday under the pretext of business, having a whale of a time, and charging it to company expenses.

Iranian mathematician, Stanford professor and Fields Medal winner Maryam Mirzakhani (who recently died from breast cancer) specialised in the geometry and dynamics of complex curved surfaces, working on moduli spaces, Teichmüller theory, hyperbolic geometry, Ergodic theory and symplectic geometry. She leaves a husband, Czech mathematician Jan Vondrák, and a six-year-old daughter Anahita. Of course nothing in life is a given, but I suspect Anahita is one bright little girl.

A breakfast par excellence. My only concern – given you’re dashing off to work – is that bit about simmering the beans very slowly for about 40 minutes (it may take longer if they’re the dried variety). But then it is Saturday.

Breakfast like a king, scientists implore (reduces hunger cravings, especially for sweets and fats thus counteracting weight gain). Yet while featuring a photograph of every lad’s dream way of starting your day, the ‘top five brilliant breakfasts’ listed at the end of the article includes porridge topped with berries, nuts and seeds. I’d have thought more medieval peasant than king?

Boots the Chemist tells women they should keep their knickers on. Boots are a particular bête noire of mine in that they bug the pants off me every time I purchase a particular brand of decongestants. On two occasions I’ve been accused of buying the tablets to convert into speed or ice. For the avoidance of doubt I was unsure what speed and ice were and had to resort to Google.

Thursday, July 20

It’s a common fallacy that – at least in economic terms – millennials will fare worse than their parents. Social mobility has stalled, they say. What is more surprising, however, is that – given how much money we’ve pumped into education (spending per pupil is double that of the mid-90s) – the literacy and numeracy skills of 16-24 year olds are amongst the worst in the developed world, and pretty much where they were 25 years ago. Contrary to popular belief, the younger generation are no more literate or numerate than the generation now approaching retirement, that much maligned (non-graduate) UKIP-voting Brexit generation. Is it any wonder industry and commerce want to keep the post-Brexit doors open.

It’s that time of year: wrapped bales stockpiled for winter feed in the corners of neighbouring fields, Gudgeon stacking cut wood for winter – ash and beech. Sheep, cattle and horses in every direction…the sound of tractors, quad bikes and chainsaws.

And though to keep my brain and body alive I need the honey of the city hive, I also need for nurture of the heart the rowan berries and the painted cart, the bell at noon, the scythesman in the corn, the cross of rushes, and the fairy thorn. (John Hewett)

I find three hours in town is sufficient, then I’m good to go for another week.

Wednesday, July 19

This morning’s communique from our local authority gives notice of a reorganisation and a corresponding tax rise. I’m led to believe there’s an appetite for cost cutting through consolidating neighbouring councils but that everyone wants more services and is anxious to pay for it. As with Margaret Thatcher’s poll tax, I’m obviously on the wrong side of history.

“A family on £14k/year has fully 75 percent of the net income of the £70k family? Even if housing benefit is disregarded, the family on minimum wage still has 50 percent of the net income of the £70k family, despite earning only a fifth as much. The reason for the anomaly is that any increase in income results in a lower tax credit payment which is then countered by increased housing benefit. This interaction means that the increasing gross earnings from £20k to £60k only increases net income by £7k – only £130 extra per week despite trebling your gross salary. Why would a company offer their staff a pay rise when the staff themselves will see little benefit? Why would an employee seek to move to a higher-paying job? Why would an employee increase their productivity? Why is home ownership declining? There is also the matter of fairness to taxpayers. The family earning £70k will pay the same total amount through taxation as the family earning £14k receive in benefits.”

Adverts which encourage gender stereotypes like women cleaning up after their family, or men failing to do housework, face being banned under strict new watchdog rules. The Advertising Standards Authority found there was evidence to support stronger rules on the basis that harmful stereotypes can restrict the choices, aspirations and opportunities of children, young people and adults. Meanwhile an Audit Scotland report confirms that male students continue to snub female-dominated courses such as nursing and health care despite tough new gender quotas designed to balance up Scottish colleges. The number of women enrolling in social work courses has risen to 97 per cent while their representation in health grew to 87 per cent in defiance of Government targets to increase male allocations. Only marginal progress has been made in attracting women to engineering and transport with men accounting for 84 per cent and 92 per cent of students respectively.

“She (Melissa Kite) is in the green belt, and the green belt is crowded and fraught and terrified that it is about to be eaten up by London. Further, its inhabitants are increasingly the same bad-tempered, moaning, sociopathic middle-class tossers that one finds in the capital. People who have got the hell out to avoid being the victims of an acid attack, or a jihadi stabbing, or an LGBTQI workshop. But they still want quick and ready access to London. In other words, it IS London, in all but name. And that will change too – soon there will be no green belt at all, it will just be London.” (Rod Liddle)

Parliament and MSM are continuing to sell the line that Brexit’s a busted flush. Apparently we’ve changed our mind, and if they say it often enough it will become so. It was never really about immigration, they say, a chastened Brussels will provide sufficient cosmetic assurances to satisfy the plebs. Then with no little irony they decry the state of play in Turkey, Erdoğan’s crackdown on dissidents, journalists and human rights activists, as part of last year’s failed coup attempt.

Sunday, July 16

“Well, we do it at night, with pistols. Everybody wearing cutoffs and tennis shoes. We’ll set the dogs loose, and when they start baying we come running. Now, the dogs will go after the pig’s nuts, so the pig will back up against a tree to protect himself. So then you just take your pistol and pop him in the eye.” I appreciate it’s a long read, but remember what we used to say: what happens in America usually happens here a decade or so later.

Saturday, July 15

A concept my generation once thought more likely than not, that led to Diane Abbott riding pillion on Jeremy Corbyn’s motorcycle, appears to have fallen prey to contemporary mores. According to a YouGov survey only 9.4 per cent of white people are enthusiastic about dating someone from a different racial group, with only 5.0 per cent of under-24s having actually dated outside their own racial background. Like most I’m dubious of polls – and this one seems a bit extreme. If it is an accurate assessment then we’re in more trouble than I thought.

Up town for supplies this morning. My first stop was the hole-in-the-wall for cash. In common with many I was a little disturbed by Matthew Taylor’s report this week, reiterating the call for a cashless society. Several years ago some smart alec at my bank, in an effort to impress and to encourage further use of their services, mailed me a report on my spending over the previous twelve months. We’re talking a breakdown of every penny disbursed from that account. I appreciate everything is on file somewhere but, having spent so many years trying to fly beneath the radar, to have my life laid out so clearly was somewhat troubling – like being tracked around town on a pub crawl. Needless to say, since then…

Teachers working in deprived areas should be offered subsidised housing as a way to tackle geographical disparities between schools, a new report has recommended. Guess I’m missing something, inasmuch as deprived areas are presumed to have low-cost housing? But then the Social Market Foundation who produced the report is headed by former deputy prime minister Nick Clegg. I listened to the lad pontificate on the subject yesterday. He listed a series of initiatives, none of which worth the paper they’re printed on. As Gaby Hinsliff notes, the Cleggs of the world are sitting pretty and should be honest enough at least to recognise it in the mirror.

Public Health England – a pain in the neck if ever there was one – says we’re becoming a nation of pox-ridden degenerate pensioners, and by implication a drain on the public purse. Because we have the temerity to live longer, the country is set to be haunted by waves of zombie-like dementia sufferers. Fortunately there’s an answer: for a mere £50, Dr Philip Nitschke will introduce us to the merits of neo-barbiturates and the SARCO Nitrogen System. As it happens, only yesterday I was reading BJ Butler’s interview with Roy Jones Jr. It concluded with an anecdote by Jones about his old barber who’d been told if he kept drinking he was gonna die. Of course he kept on drinking until he died. His final words were “I gotta die of something.”

Thursday, July 13

Ross Clark is singing my song, and yet it appears all the government (and opposition) want to do is piss it away like there’s no tomorrow. Not only failing to fix the roof while the sun shines, we are contemplating taking off some more tiles. Filed under Magic Money Trees.

Up early this morning in an effort to complete my duties before Wimbledon and Newmarket kick off. With grass now cut and paddocks topped the old homestead is looking a lot neater, although a couple of guys with chainsaws wouldn’t go amiss. Someone must have been out with a gun as squirrels are thin on the ground this year. Moles have returned with a vengeance, along with two strange cats. There’s supposed to be a plague of adders but I haven’t seen them. Lots of frogs and toads … and our song thrush have fledged.

Tuesday, July 11

Dreich, as Mrs G. would say, doesn’t quite cut it. It’s lashing down. Misty, too. Even clad in waterproofs, two and a half hours across the moor is about the limit to today’s enthusiasm. Can now settle back and watch the tennis with a clear conscience.

“Little trotty wagtail, he went in the rain, …” Each year we host nesting Pied Wagtails – bright handsome little birds – with successive broods feeding in the yard. This year we also have a family of Grey Wagtails.

“Nor one from Hull…” says The Times Robert Crampton. All true of course. But if the doctor treating you delivers his prognosis in an accent reminiscent of Benny Hawkins from Crossroads, or the financial adviser to whom you are entrusting your pension has a Scouse accent, you would probably seek a second opinion.

Sunday, July 9

It claimed the British army visits English universities and private schools in the search for future officers, while targeting poorer neighbourhoods for enlisted personnel, particularly in northern cities and in Wales. The British Army is targeting working-class youngsters from deprived backgrounds and with limited options who would be attracted to a life of adventure and excitement... what exactly am I missing here?

Saturday morning was the usual run to Tavistock Market for inspiration. My turn to cook, so surprise, surprise, we ate barbecue. A chicken the size of a small ostrich, flavoured with garlic, rosemary and lemon. One of the Boss’s favourites: a win-win for yours truly. Today’s repast is (obviously) leftover chicken, with red rice – another favourite. My list of chores is growing… Will address them tomorrow. I promise.

Saturday, July 8

Many younger (better educated) Greeks blame the older generation for years of communal state looting. For millennials there will be no Greek dream of a pension, coffees and sun from the age of sixty, they may never even retire – just dream of leaving. The ranks of lower-middle-class pensioners, junior civil servants and small shopkeepers are disappearing, leaving a society divided between the rich and the poor. The richest Athenians have had a nice crisis, they just take care not to flash their cash like before. Ten years ago, Greece imagined it had become northern Italy, but is has since discovered it’s more like Bulgaria.

Of course many young Greeks will continue to come to Britain, joining young French, Italian and Spanish migrants … and the Prime Minister and Chancellor have yet to decide if this is a problem or the solution.

“On days like these when skies are blue and fields are green…” How about Quincy Jones composes the music and Don Black writes the lyrics, the recording is produced by George Martin and sung by Matt Monroe. Of course there’s also the Lamborghini Miura and Alpine highway...

Friday, July 7

Even the wealthy holiday at home these days. Thankfully the temperature is minus three or four degrees on yesterday, though it hasn’t eased the continuous flow of people down from London. Car parks were full (of Porsche, Range Rover and Mercedes) a full thirty minutes earlier than usual. I loaded up the motor and got the hell out of town asap…. Now back at the homestead with a frosted glass of Samuel Smith’s (can you believe ‘Organic’) Lager, watching the tennis – Azarenka v Watson. Nabokov’s indescribable itch of rapture aside, my detachment is such I’m finding it difficult to differentiate between the two girls and a couple of racehorses.

Why sleep is more important than diet and exercise. Early start for Gudgeon this morning, out across the moor before seven. Come mid-morning it’s too hot and the only thing worth doing is to stretch out on a bench in the yard. I dropped off late afternoon yesterday on returning from Exeter and didn’t wake until half-ten, came indoors and toddled upstairs to bed. Suspect a tracking app to monitor my sleep pattern would be a waste.

Two things spring to mind, the first of which is housing. Assuming you are ready to settle down and begin a family during your thirties, how exactly do you conjure up a suitable home – there are only so many. The second problem being how to pay for it. In what now seems the fantasy world of yore it wasn’t unknown for organisations to periodically reinvigorate themselves. Burgeoning pension schemes and premature death allowed for the wholesale removal of middle and senior ranks who’d grown stale, clearing the way for a more dynamic cadre with new ideas. With the demise of final salary pension schemes and more healthy lifestyles, however, silverbacks continue ad infinitum (think Margaret Beckett, Ken Clarke…Robert Mugabe). Of course what slim chance your average thirty-something has of securing the key to an executive bathroom isn’t helped by our ongoing recruitment of the world’s brightest and best. Is it so unbelievable that Labour has a lead among voters from such a stymied demographic?

Wednesday, July 5

Hopes that Britain was putting the chronic problem of low productivity behind it have been dealt a blow by official figures showing that the key measure of future prosperity has fallen for the first time since 2015.

Tragic in every sense. Who among us wasn’t horrified by the fire and moved to proffer support for the victims. That said there must be lots of people in traditional Labour heartlands watching the aftermath unfold and wondering, who exactly are these foreign people with heavily accented English that are making such demands, and how exactly do they qualify for subsidised accommodation in fashionable Kensington and Chelsea instead of the traditional out-of-town sink estates the rest of us inhabit.

“It was the older protesters who stood out – the flinty faced, superannuated Trotskyites in their fifties or sixties still wearing jeans and denim jackets festooned with badges declaring antipathy to everything from capitalism to badger culling… a Praetorian Guard of groups such as the Socialist Workers and Communist parties.” “No one remembers from the first time round,” says Philip Johnston. Oh yes we do, sonny, if you recall we produced sitcoms about them – still chuckle to ourselves every time Jeremy appears on stage.

Tuesday, July 4

Monday, July 3

Philip Hammond says “The serious question to the electorate cannot be 'would you like us to tax someone who isn’t you to pay for you to consume more?', but 'would you be willing to pay more tax to consume more public services?'”

A new global survey across 25 countries finds that 57% of the global public think Britain’s influence on world affairs is positive. Britain comes mid-table; however our rating ranges widely from 76% in India being positive about us to only 29% in Spain. This reflects a general pattern of EU countries seeing us less positively than others - although we shouldn't overplay our image problem with our continental neighbours: still over half the population in Italy, Sweden, Hungary, Poland and France are positive about our impact on the world. Germany and Belgium are less convinced, alongside Spain. Two thirds (66%) of Britons believe we are a positive influence on world affairs, rating only Canada (87%) and Australia (84%) above ourselves. Unsurprisingly, given the Brexit vote, 48% believe the EU has a positive influence on world affairs, whilst 52% believe its influence is negative.

He also claimed that the company’s senior management meeting was held during a boozy event every Tuesday night at the Lion Hotel in Worksop, a short drive from Sport Direct’s head office in Derbyshire. The meeting typically commenced in the bar area at around 8pm with Mr Ashley drinking alcohol at the bar while in discussions with management. Blue alleged that dinner would be served at around 10.30pm with the gathering concluding between 1am and 3am.

Jackie Smith, the NMC’s Chief Executive and Registrar, has been plodding round television studios this morning, bemoaning the number of nurses and midwives leaving the profession. Knee-jerk reaction of most is to criticise low pay. Never backward in virtue signalling, who wouldn’t agree to more money for nurses, not least as Gudgeon’s neighbourhood is home to so many NHS employees. Listening to a nurse interviewed on Sky News, however, I was left with the impression she thought too many of the wrong sort train for the profession and then fail to measure up. The Guardian, never slow to leap onboard a public sector grievance, confirms that just 8% of the nurses who had left cited pay and benefits as the reason. Unfortunately Jackie Smith did a passible imitation of Diane Abbott on Nick Ferrari’s show and failed to shed light on the subject.

Sunday, July 2

Sunday morning political shows on the telly can turn the air blue – and raised voices frighten the horses. Though I’m told everyone wants to pay more taxes to fund public services, I’ve yet to meet Mr Everyone. Half the buggers in the Dog & Duck who are screaming for an increase in public sector investment don’t actually pay tax, and those that do are invariably sucking on the public teat. That said, in the interest of objectivity – to provide balance to Mrs G’s more trenchant views, I sometimes don my Comrade Corbyn cap. A dangerous gambit when there are bottles to hand.

Saturday, July 1

Beware the lean and hungry look Which Caesar rightly feared, The skinny man to stratagem And spitefulness is geared, Would Cassius at forteen stone Have felt the need to bitch? And would lado fuller-faced Have queered Othello’s pitch? It’s well observed how cheerfulness Is found in well-filled suits. As those who value sweetness know To seek out softer fruits. So let us laud the larger man Devoid of schemes and wiles, Whose munching muscles swell the cheeks And wreathe a face in smiles

This could of course be construed as a jibe on Jeremy Corbyn. However I include Tim Hopkin's poem in remembrance of an old business partner – the one with the cadaverous face, the long, lank, skeleton hand.

Gigi remains the favourite. That charming old lecher, Honoré Lachaille. Can you imagine trying to produce a similar film these days: Gaston, everyone’s favourite playboy, almost certainly a Tory, seducing the 15-year-old granddaughter of a friend? “Now with 80% Less Perv.”

Am reclined on a comfortable chair in the snug. Outside the sun is beating down. The homestead’s windows are open, admitting a pleasant breeze. There’s a chilled glass of Viré-Clessé at my elbow and a pre-lunch appetiser – an expensive ‘artisan’ terrine*. Marvin Gaye croons from the wireless and I’ve a mountain of reading material. All is right with the world…Charles Moore speaks to me:

“The phrase ‘bucket list’ entered the language early this century, and you now hear it most days. It means your self-chosen list of the things you must do before you die. There is something wrong about the psychology behind this. More of us are troubled by doing too much, not too little. Life involves innumerable lists of tasks, and this makes one ill-prepared for death. The best bucket-shop list of things to do would simply say ‘Less’.”